


i'm almost me again (she's almost you)

by harrietscats



Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Rewrite
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-10-20 16:09:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20678168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harrietscats/pseuds/harrietscats
Summary: The binds around her wrist were rough, as if they had been scrounged quickly from wreckage. But they were effective. Whoever the knot tier was, they were extremely adept at their job. As she staggered to her feet, vision blanking and stomach heaving as dizziness overtook, she noticed that the scent of wet iron was especially thick on the air.She knew that smell."Blood?" she quipped, sparing a glance at her surroundings.She stood on the very incline of a knoll, shirt tacky with drying blood. The blue haired man named Chrom held her now by the join of rope between her wrists, preventing her from both falling and running. The little cleric in yellow was the young woman's height, and gazed on in worry, holding tight to an ornate staff that denoted her station as cleric. Up on the hill behind the young woman and her saviors-cum-jailers lay an overturned cart, smoking with the remains of a flame recently extinguished. Just by smelling it, without needing to get any closer than she already was, she could tell that the destruction was magically wrought.The stranger looked at her saviors."I didn't do that, did I?"





	1. Premonition

Thunder was always her forté.

She could just barely recall snippets of her childhood: a wisp of sand in the air, heralding a _ khamaseen_. Sweet dates eaten under the shade of a palm tree. Twilight services with cowled figures, her mother's hand tight on her shoulder as she said the dead words of invocation; fear in her voice, fear in her mother’s. Hours spent mouthing words in her mother's tome quietly to herself, as if making the shapes with her mouth would somehow imbue her with their power. True, she had eventually gained a passing mastery of the other elemental magics (only after her nameless, faceless tutor denounced her as a disappointment, barren of "His Gift"), but the magnetism of thunder magic reverberated in her very bones, rattled her teeth and flickered across her fingertips.

_ Easifa mutlaq_. That was what her faceless mother called her. A tuning fork for both destruction and creation. Black and white. Life and death. Good and evil. Naga and Grima.

She clenched both sword and tome in opposite hands. Thunder rolled from her fingertips, from her nigh inexhaustible source of mana. The sickly glow of dark magic painted the air purple. Beside her, in counterpoint, a faceless man in blue and white roared his triumph and rose a gleaming broadsword to strike. But the caster of dark magic was there before him, leaping into the air and conjuring an eruption of purple flames, hot and cold and burning the very soul from her bones. She and her compatriot leapt in opposing directions, away from the magically birthed flames. In response, thunder crackled from her fingertips, striking outward and lancing toward the body of the hierophant.

Again, however, he was far faster. As talented as she may have been, the man was older, wizened by years and the unforgiving desert. The man wreathed in purple was already on the ground by the time her spell made contact with the ceiling. Again, his purple flames dashed outward, throwing her blue compatriot into a support pillar hard enough for his body to shatter it to chips.

Without thinking, mana worming and pooling as her comrade clambered to his feet with the help of his brilliantly gleaming broadsword, she cast one of the more potent thunder spells in her repertoire, let hit coalesce into a writhing ball of energy, and forced its path to intercept that of the dark magic, which was busily making its way toward her fallen friend with all the strength of a meteor.

The resulting explosion was enough to throw her, her friend, and the enemy in opposing directions. Moaning, tome and sword forgotten several meters away, she came to a skidding halt almost halfway down the antechamber's length, prostrate upon her back and coughing blood.

She heard someone cry out her name.

Then: "No! This can't be how it ends!" 

But she was alive. 

In pain, but alive. 

The shockwave should have pulverised organs, broken bones, used her as a conduit for loose magic and blown her up until nothing remained but atoms. But her resistance to magic had always been notoriously high. She had been lucky to escape it with nothing more than raw, scraped skin and a mouthful of blood from her bitten tongue.

Down the antechamber, where she had begun the fight alongside her friend and ally, the ring of metal against metal met her ears. The battle that raged beyond the barrier was soft, muted. She, her friend, and the enemy were relegated in their own pocket universe. This clash of battle was much closer. Propping herself up onto her elbows, she blinked weakly as her friend pivoted and parried at the enemy, and watched in ever mounting horror as his blows were deflected by dark magic, a magic that she feared to call upon.

Her friend noticed her weak stirrings.

"Just... run!" He gritted out, ducking low and rolling to the side. "Run while you can!"

Though distance blinded him, she shook her head. What kind of_ (friend, tactician, wife?) _ would she be if she abandoned him, her _ (friend, commander, husband?). _

The enemy laughed with glee, renewed his attack with fervor. "Fools!" thundered the enemy. "Struggle all you want! You cannot unwrite what is already written!" His conjurations of magic exploded over the defence of his broadsword. Her friend's strength was flagging, and she couldn't even pull herself off the ground.

"You can't escape it!" continued the enemy, redoubling his efforts to slay the man in blue. "These events were laid in place a thousand years ago. You cannot fight destiny!"

_ We're not pawns of some scripted fate. _Hadn't she once said those words, denying what the enemy had said long ago?

She could not let the man in blue die and prove her wrong.

Strength gone, mana weakly surging, she struggled to both feet and lurched unsteadily toward the battle at hand, pausing only to pick up her smoking, half ruined tome. True, many powerful sages and sorcerers could conjure magic to do their bidding with only a thought; she believed that she too could hold such mastery with almost childish ease. However, the magic she wished to call upon was beyond her, even in her addled state. So she was left to drunkenly leaf through her tome, letting the magic of each page guide her hand.

Her friend looked at her, desperation and excitement coloring his face.

"On my mark!" came his war cry, a sentence she felt he had said many times before.

The enemy turned, eyebrow raised, as if he hadn't expected her to rise so quickly from the explosion, if at all. Hand outstretched, mana writhing with magnetism in preparation for the spell at hand, she offered the man wreathed in purple one parting word:

"Checkmate."

The magic literally exploded from her fingertips, arcing forward like a bolt of lighting sent from the heavens. True, the magic was weak (at least, weaker than her previous castings), but it still caught the enemy in his chest, just as her comrade-in-arm's gleaming broadsword caught him through the shoulder, nearly cleaving his raised arm from his body. He fell in two separate pieces, never to rise again. Chest heaving, she stumbled to where her bloodied friend stood, tome tumbling uselessly from weak fingers.

They had won. Against all odds, they had _ won. _She resisted the urge to smile.

"This isn't over."

She looked beyond the man in blue, stared in abject horror at the hierophant. He kneeled on the ground, consumed in bubbling, miasmic energy. His body bled, and what little of it didn't, bled of mana. The desperation of a dying hierophant, (_Fisher king_, whispered her mind, like the first winds of a _ khamaseen_), pooled it into shape. Intent. She knew he was going to cast before he said his own parting words to them:

"Damn you both!"

That amount of mana dedicated to a single spell could only mean one thing. It was as if she had been electrocuted. The charge of his dark magic zapped over her skin, raised gooseflesh, jolted her to awareness and action, made her aware of his intent to cast.

She didn't think. She didn't have time. The dark magic surged toward her comrade in a miasmic flare of purple and black. She lacked the mana to counter with her own spellcraft. So she did the next best thing:

Her shove caught the man in blue by surprise, eyes going wide and mouth dropping in question as her arm caught him in the chest and forced him aside. He had not seen nor sensed the hierophant's casting efforts; his back had been turned trustingly to the felled enemy. She let out a moan-turned-scream as the full brunt of the dying hierophant's magic caught her full in the chest with force like a hammer striking an anvil. Again she skidded along the flagstone floor, taking the brunt of the blows with her bony joints and shoulders as she rolled and tumbled like an out of control barrel down a hill.

She didn't know how long she lay there, feeling dazed and battling against the dark as it slid through her blood like slime. She became aware only as the man in blue knelt at her side, picked her up by the shoulders and lifted so that she was half in his lap, head leaning against his breastplate so she could survey the ruined antechamber, the ruined king, who disappeared into energy, body finally spent.

"Are you all right?" he inquired. She couldn't bring herself to speak, so she nodded. Her body protested even that simple movement, but she bit back reflexive wince of it.

His smile was worried, weary and relieved.

"Thanks to you, we carried the day." She looked away from his smiling face to look at her splayed legs, burned and bleeding. If she squinted, she was certain she could see white bone between her charred trousers and the ruined meat of her legs. No vulnerary paste nor elixir could salvage that amount of damage, no matter how good the cleric. "We can rest easy now."

Her whole head throbbed. With little warning, her vision tunnelled, became wrought with crawling red veins of dark. Her friend was still saying things—of comfort, reassurance—but she was no longer listening. It was not for lack of trying; the throbbing in her skull became so powerful that she could barely hear his words. She panicked, grabbed at his hand, the ruins of her pants, praying that it would go away, that she could—_would_—fight.

That was when her friend noticed that something was wrong. His face entered her line of sight, the light at the end of the tunnel and layered with red. Why was there so much red? Why was her grasping hands beginning to channel mana that she did not have to spare? Why was the voice in her head whispering such evil things?

"At long last." She heard that. She heard the voice in her head incanting. She felt herself stand on legs that, under any other circumstance, would not support her.

"What's wrong?" The question was so innocent. Her hand was thick with mana. The voice in her head was bringing magic to life, a magic she wanted no part in.

She knew that she had the ability to cast magic without a tome. It was too bad that it took possession to cement that hypothesis as fact.

There was apprehension—not quite fear. Not yet—in his eyes as he too climbed to his feet, sweat beading his brow and body lax from the aftereffects of the battle. Even now, when threatened, he would not attack her. Where did his faith end and his conscience begin? Was he really that good of a man?

Protesting internally, screaming against a voice that would not let her from its grasp, she listened to his panic-fuelled protests, a measly "Hey, hold on—" before she cut his inquiry short with a dagger of thunder to the chest.

Thunder was always her forté. It was only fitting that she killed with it.

Her friend, brother, comrade, a hundred other words, stumbled backward, hand held around the dagger that still protruded from his chest like a macabre flag. Vision clear, head no longer pounding incessantly, voice silent, legs a screaming polestar of agony, she collapsed in a heap, stared dumbstruck at her hand. Her fitted glove still crackling with excess magnetism.

_ Oh no. _

Even dying, her friend was not condemnatory. He looked at her earnestly through fading blue eyes.

"This is... not your—" He collected himself, groaning with pain. "Your fault." Another pause, longer this time. His breath came in ragged gasps. She couldn't find the words in her to call for someone to fix her sin.

"Promise me..." he ground out, fighting death to absolve her, impart further wisdom. "Promise me that you'll escape from this place."

How could she? She had murdered her most trusted ally, the man she put above herself since... since... Forever? As far back as her memories stretched.

"Promise me!" His voice was harsh, full of command. How could she say no to him?

"I will." Her voice was weak, throaty, thick with unshed tears.

That seemed to be what he was waiting for. His smile was more of a pained grimace.

"Please... go."

Those were the last words he ever said to her. The man crumpled to the ground, life extinguished at her hand, as a voice that sounded suspiciously like her own cackled triumph and screamed in anguish.


	2. The Verge of History

She drifted, numb, slowly to consciousness.

"Chrom, we have to do _ something_."

That was the voice of a girl, or a particularly high pitched woman. The annoying lilt of the girl's words burrowed into her brain and made her want to claw her ears off, just to get it to stop, if only for a blessed, peace filled moment. 

But she didn't move. 

_ Do something about whom? _ she thought, exhausted. Certainly not her. She was just…

Wait. What _ was _ she doing?

"What do you propose we do?"

That was not the high pitched young woman (_Thank heavens _, she privately thought). That was the voice of a man, vowels and consonants punched and pronounced like a member of the aristocracy. His voice sounded familiar, enough to bother her thoughts. Had she fallen asleep—

Her head throbbed mercilessly as she struggled to remember. It was as though a thousand knives were being thrust into her skull without end, only stopping when she was ready to die to avoid it. Instead of screaming like she wanted to, the young woman let out a pitiful moan and stirred, waited for the pounding to abate so she could resume thought.

She had to know what happened to her.

Judging by the lack of question in her direction, the aristocrat took no notice of her distress, even as she fought to open her eyes. It was a monumental task, but she managed, blinking slowly up into the sunlight that burned her eyes and made her wince. Two distinctively human shapes leaned above her, invaded her limited line of sight. They blotted out much of the sun, to which she was eternally grateful.

"I... I dunno."

The voice of the young woman returned. This time, despite its piercing nature, she found a soothing quality to it. Again she resisted the urge to groan; instead, she let herself grunt her discomfort and nestle deeper into the knoll of grass that she found herself sprawled in. A rock dug uncomfortably into her lower back, but she didn't care. She was comfortable, or as comfortable as she could be. Why was her shirt so sticky? Why did it smell like wet metal? Blinking, the young woman stared uncomprehendingly up at the two people above her, confusion beginning to give away to discomforted anxiety.

That got the nobles to realize that the young woman was awake. The woman of the pair (really, she was more of a girl) bent down further into the stranger's slowly clearing line of sight. Pale blonde hair was done up in high pigtails, framed by a lace veil, or headscarf of sorts. Was the woman a cleric? She looked barely old enough to be an apprentice. To compliment the yellow of her hair, the girl wore yellow, brown, and white. She really hoped they would be introduced. It would be rude to refer to one's rescuer as "the yellow cleric".

"I see you're awake now," said the man, still retaining his respectable distance above the young woman, even from his bent state. He wasn't as close to her as the girl was—the girl was practically in her face—but his voice was still soothing, assuring, as present as if he had been as close as the girl was.

"Hey there," the yellow cleric said gently, voice dropping mercifully into pitch.

"Hi," she returned dumbly, softly. Her voice sounded weak, hoarse, as if she had spent several nights screaming at the top of her lungs without respite. The taste of iron was especially thick in her mouth, almost disgusting. She resisted the urge to spit—she was in the presence of nobility, after all.

"There are better places to take a nap then on the ground, you know," said the man, admonishing, the hint of a joke in his easygoing smile.

Perhaps the young woman had garnered a head wound before she had been knocked unconscious. In her wildest dreams, she would never have said to nobility, "Don't knock it until you try it," had she been in full possession of her faculties. Or perhaps she would have; there was little she knew about herself at the moment.

The man laughed. Now that her vision was clear, she could see that he was very, very blue. Not in temperament, but in, well, everything else. His hair was blue. His eyes were blue. The only thing that wasn't totally blue was his outfit; that was silver, white, and blue. Why did he look so familiar? Why did the girl look so familiar? Why couldn't she remember her own bloody name?

"Give me your hands."

His almost-order broke her out of the spiraling thoughts of panic in her brain. Smiling gratefully, the young woman extended a hand upward.

It was when she lifted a hand to take his that she noticed that her wrists were bound.

_ Oh, this certainly doesn't bode well. _

"I don't—" she began uncertainly.

"Rest easy, friend," said the man—_Chrom _ , the young woman thought, struck with a moment of complete surety. _ His name is Chrom_—as he moved to gently haul her to her feet by her forearms. The binds around her wrist were rough, as if they had been scrounged quickly from wreckage. But they were effective. Whoever the knot tier was, they were extremely adept at their job. As she staggered to her feet, vision blanking and stomach heaving as dizziness overtook, she noticed that the scent of wet iron was especially thick on the air.

She knew that smell.

"Blood?" she quipped, sparing a glance at her surroundings.

She stood on the very incline of a knoll, shirt tacky with drying blood. The blue haired man named Chrom held her now by the join of rope between her wrists, preventing her from both falling and running. The little cleric in yellow was just an inch or so taller than the young woman, and gazed on in worry. Up on the hill behind the young woman and her saviors (or jailers, she honestly couldn’t decide) lay an overturned cart, smoking with the remains of a flame recently extinguished.

The stranger looked at her saviors.

"I didn't do that, did I?" She pointed for measure, at the overturned cart and blackened corpses that surely lurked inside. There was a heaviness in the air, a charge against her skin that made the hairs on her forearms rise. The only one who seemed remotely aware of it was the little cleric. _ Not surprising_, the young woman found herself thinking. _ She's got talent_. 

"That's what we're trying to find out," said Chrom, sparing the young woman's thoughts. He tossed a glance over his shoulder "Some of us, however, are overly cautious."

"I wasn't aware that your lands were so dangerous to warrant the arrest of an unconscious, bleeding woman," the young woman retorted dryly.

"Oh, you're not bleeding anymore," piped the young blonde. "I took care of that!"

Almost as immediately as the cleric had said the words, the young woman winced as fresh pain bloomed in her side and forehead. It felt as if she had been run over by a cart, then stitched back together wrong. 

The young cleric looked apologetic.

"Well, most of it, anyway," she amended.

The injured party smiled what she hoped was a reassuring smile. "It's okay. I can tell you did a fine job." She then looked at the impassive third figure who Chrom had looked at before.

Standing even taller than Chrom (a man who's shoulder was level with the top of the young woman's head), this man was arrayed in bright, silver armor, polished to a blinding sheen. She squinted; it was like staring into the sun. His brown eyes glared at her, condemning her for some crime she did not commit. 

Or maybe she did, and just couldn't remember. 

There was a lot she couldn't remember at the moment.

"Although," the young woman continued, just a hint of frost in her voice, "some of the party wishes your talented cleric didn't do such a fine job."

The enormous knight didn't give her the pleasure of coloring as the young cleric blushed at the praise. Instead, he said:

"I would never wish such harm on an individual, milady."

Sniffing derisively, she looked back to Chrom, the only individual she knew. Well, sort of knew. Why was he so bloody familiar, and she couldn't even remember her own name?

"No matter," Chrom cut in diplomatically. "What matters is, are you all right?"

Finally, some politeness. Momentarily distracted by a small flock of tiny birds, she managed to smile another crookedly reassuring smile.

"I think so," she said. "Thank you, Chrom."

Chrom's eyebrow shot up. She would have smacked herself had her hands not been bound; instead she settled for biting the inside of her lip in chastisement.

_ Stupid. _

"Oh? You know who I am?"

She rubbed the back of her head. Or attempted to. With her hands bound, all she could manage was a nervous rub at her hairline with a single finger.

_ I have no idea who these people are. And here I go, opening my big mouth. _

"No…" she said, dragging out the sound.

_ Because _ that _ doesn't sound suspicious at all. _

"It just..." She struggled for an explanation that just wouldn't come. "Came to me, I guess?"

_ Bravo. Now they'll really think you're their murderer. _

Chrom didn't seem to be bothered any. If anything, he looked pleasantly bemused.

"So what are you doing in this field here, then?" he asked. "Lying in the grass just a few meters away from a highway robbery?"

The stranger paused for a minute, wracked her aching brain for any other answer besides: _ His name is Chrom _ and _ Stop bothering me. I'm hurting, you ass. _

"I'm not entirely sure about that, either," the young woman admitted.

Again, Chrom's affected bemusement only grew.

"Tell me then," he continued. "What's your name, friend?"

The young woman only shrugged helplessly and offered her bound hands to him.

"Your guess is as good as mine."

_ Shut your mouth, already. If you keep this up, scary knight over there is going to behead you for this trouble. He seems like the kind of person to approve of executions without fair trials. _

The little yellow cleric immediately leapt to attention, knowledge shining in her blue eyes and bright smile. The young woman decided she liked her.

"I've heard of this!" the cleric piped up, almost raising her hand in excitement. "It's called amnesia!"

The young woman looked at the young cleric, both pleased with her knowledge and confused. However, she wasn't about to ask the cleric what 'amnesia' meant. That would make her seem even less intelligent than she already seemed. However, the knight who had taken it upon himself to place her under arrest chose that moment to speak again.

"It's called a load of pegasus dung," he said, impassive as he stood beside his equally imposing charger. The woman would be lying if she said she wasn't intimidated.

She wasn't intimidated enough, however, to keep quiet.

"It's the truth!" the young woman snapped bitingly. "It's not my fault if your head is jammed too far up your armored—"

"Enough!" snapped Chrom. "Frederick, what if she is telling the truth? What kind of Shepherds would we be if we left her here, alone and confused?"

So the young woman had one advocate for her cause. Possibly two, if the little blonde cleric's healing of her was anything to go by. That still didn't explain why she was still bound.

"So if you don't think I'm a danger," hedged the woman diplomatically, "why don't you just let me go?" She proffered her hands expectantly.

"I would advise against such action, milord," said the vaguely menacing knight named Frederick. Judging by the sour look on his face, he didn't miss the young woman's scornful mutter of, "Of course you would." He merely continued as if she hadn't said anything.

"I would not let a wolf loose amongst our sheep."

Chrom looked between the woman and his fellow, heavily armed shepherds (_How dangerous is this place? _ she thought as Chrom disappeared into his thoughts. _ First bandits, now this? Maybe it would do me good to get away from these people while I still can..._)

Before the young woman could even move to flee, Chrom continued:

"We'll take her back to town and get this sorted there."

That got her to stop edging slightly up the knoll. The 'amnesiac'—she really did have to ask what that meant, embarrassment be damned—immediately leapt on the defensive; strange energy began to gather in her gut, ready to explode outward in defense of her person.

_ Well, that isn't weird at all. _

"Why?" the young woman challenged. "So you can lock me up like that good knight wants?" Matching the knight and his horse with a glare of her own, she spat: "No, thank you. I would rather take my chances with your organized bandits."

Chrom's expression once again changed to that of bemusement.

"And how do you suppose you'll accomplish that, friend?" His eyes drifted tellingly to the rough rope tied tightly around her wrists. The stranger hadn't even noticed that she had begun to twist her hands, in a vain attempt to exploit some sort of weakness. All she had gained from her efforts was chafed skin and more blood on her.

Not deterred in the slightest, the woman rose her chin haughtily.

"I'll find a way," she sniffed. "I'm... crafty."

That got a laugh out of all parties, minus the grump of a knight and his equally ill-tempered horse. Ears burning with embarrassment, the woman refused to relinquish her aggressive and haughty position, even if it did look ridiculous.

"We won't formally arrest you, if you don't have anything to do with the bandits," assured the little cleric.

Again, the stranger proffered her bound and aching wrists, this time to the girl.

"So I'm to assume that this is a traditional greeting here?" The woman returned her ire to Chrom. "Don't I have a say in where I get to go? Or have I magically lost that right as well?" She pointed with either index finger at the overly cautious knight. "For gods' sake, _ he's _ already determined me guilty!"

"Don't fear Frederick's unsmiling face," assured Chrom.

"I don't fear Frederick's 'unsmiling face'," snapped the woman. "I fear his actions, _ milord_."

That one word, spat like poison, slapped Chrom in the face as effectively as her palm would have. His face steeled. The pair gazed coolly at each other, a game of visual chess at play.

The stranger had an inkling that she was very good at chess.

"We'll discuss this at town," he repeated, voice cool and unfriendly. "We'll hear your case there, after we report this crime to the local garrison."

And that was it. Chrom placed a hand to the stranger's shoulder, half guiding and half forcing her up the knoll to the road. Head held high, hands bound before her, the young woman passed the overturned cart. She pretended that the smell of burnt flesh and burnt wood didn't bother her, didn't bring up shadows of memories that gave her more headaches than answers.

The stranger kept her composure on her forced march. The knight Frederick had retaken his mount; by the look the horse was giving her, it seemed that her original hypothesis that the horse was as friendly as its master was exact in its assumption. It would glare at her, and she would glare back until either she or it broke eye contact. She had lost the seven times they had locked eyes. After breaking away in a huff for the eighth, the girl began to count the blades of grass, or listen in on the hushed conversation. Such distractions gave her plenty of time to contemplate her surroundings.

The country was—for lack of a better term—beautiful. Picturesque. The road was dirt in this backwater, with wildflowers and knee high grass that smelled sweet. The sun beating down warmed comfortably, but she was still cold. The mild climate didn't bode well for her. Maybe she hailed from a land of hotter temperatures.

Still, she couldn't deny the beauty of such land, cold or not.

Chrom still stood behind her, no longer guiding but overseeing. His frostiness had faded after an hour's walk, and now he joked with the girl beside him, called her "Lissa". At least the young woman didn't have to refer to her as "the little blonde cleric"—or any variation thereof—any longer. But the young woman didn't dare open her mouth again. She was afraid that Frederick would stick her with that lance of his, or the horse would 'accidentally' trample her.

_ How much further to this town of theirs? _ she found herself wondering. _ I think I lost feeling in my legs fifteen minutes ago. _

Occasionally, Chrom would offer his charge a waterskin. She would wipe her mouth with the sleeve of her coat, and they would return to their almost companionable silence. At least she had no fear of dehydrating.

The walk gave her plenty of time to take stock of the items on her person. The shirt she wore was loose and flowing, stuck to her side where the mystery wound remained half-closed by Lissa's brief healing. The herbal scent of some medicinal paste all but assaulted her nose; it was almost as pungent as the scent of blood and stale sweat. The coat she wore was thickly lined, double collared, and hooded. When she inspected her bound hands, the sleeves (gold trimmed and black with some sort of geometric design in mauve up the sleeves) gave way to half-gloves, held in place by a single hole which her middle finger went through. Interwrapping belts supported her pants and acted as an underbust of sorts. The pants she wore were darker than her shirt and buttoned down the outer side of her legs, kept in place by the slightly dusty and well-worn boots on her feet.

She must have been a woman well suited to traveling in dangerous country, if the appropriated sword—logically, it had to belong to her. It looked too cheap to belong to a noble, or a knight—hanging over Chrom's back was any inclination.

Eventually, the woman grew tired of the quiet, the hushed japes, counting the seconds, naming the birds foraging for seeds, and struggling with a migraine in hopes of remembering her past.

"So," she began, voice thick with forced levity. "I assume I am to be your prisoner, then?"

The silence seemed to have done Chrom well, for he laughed and clapped a hand to her shoulder, as if they were very old friends. The gesture niggled at the back of her mind, and she squinted through the pain of another migraine as she tried to remember. "Hah! You'll be free to go once we've determined that you're no enemy of Ylisse."

_ That sounds like a country_. The young woman attempted to turn her head, to avoid the draw of those same tiny birds (who were nestled in a tree and whose name was on the tip of her tongue), and look Chrom in the eye without falling.

"Is that where we are?" she asked. "Ylisse?"

By the affirmative smile both Chrom and Lissa gave her, the young woman supposed that she was exact in her line of questioning.

_ Point to me, then. _

Of course, the grump riding the horse was nothing but a shower of negativity on her internal parade.

"Someone please pay this actress," he said, dour, deadpan. "She plays quite the fool! Who has never heard of the halidom? I must admit, the furrowed brow has even _ me _ half convinced."

"Perhaps because it's the truth, Sir Frederick," snapped the young woman. As Frederick opened his mouth again, she said, "Don't start, milord. I don't magically become deaf when you stop talking to me." She looked from Chrom, to Lissa, to Frederick and his horse. "If I were a true enemy of your halidom, it would be foolish for you to say your names when in earshot of me. What if I escaped? Told whoever my countrymen are that you three took me prisoner?"

"What makes you think you'll escape, milady?" Frederick sounded threatening. The young woman took notice of the tightening of his hand around his lance.

"Frederick, please," said Chrom. That commanding note was back in his voice.

"Milord." Reluctantly, he relinquished his grip and settled back into his horse's saddle with a glare in the young woman's direction.

Once hostilities had simmered to a minimum, Chrom returned his attention to the young woman.

"Where you now stand is the Halidom of Ylisse," he explained. "Ylisse is ruled over by our Exalt, Emmeryn." He gestured to himself. "I'm Chrom, but you already knew that." He gestured to the little blonde cleric. "The delicate one is my sister, Lissa—"

"I am not delicate!" Lissa exploded. Judging by her vehemence and Chrom's chuckle (even Frederick the Grump cracked a smile), this was a sentiment oft brought up and questioned.

"—And the man in charge of your preemptive arrest is Frederick the Wary."

The young woman raised an eyebrow, half mocking. " 'Frederick the Wary' ?" she repeated. "That seems to be a bit of an understatement." Again she lifted her bound wrists to drive the point home.

"And yet it is a title I hold with pride," said Frederick.

The young woman muttered, "Of course you do."

"Someone among us has to have some modicum of caution," he countered.

"You're lucky we found you when we did," said Lissa before the young woman could retort with something obscenely rude. "You would have bled out if you didn't wake up on your own. If the bandits who torched that wagon hadn't realized that you were alive…" She trailed off, leaving her grisly sentiment unspoken.

"I'm grateful," the young woman said. "But at this point, I think I'd rather take my chances with the bandits…"

She trailed off, only just realizing what Lissa had said just before.

_ Wait. They only _ think _ I bloody killed someone?! _

Incensed, the young woman pointed at Chrom. "Wait a second, you: are you _ convinced _ that I'm responsible for that massacre back there?"

Chrom looked back to Frederick the Wary.

"Frederick is overly cautious—" he began.

"Chrom, this goes beyond 'overly cautious'," said the woman, shaking her hands. "I can't remember much, but I can assure you that I am not the enemy here!" Turning to Frederick, somehow keeping her balance as she walked backwards, she continued on her tirade.

"Sir Frederick, would I—in my extremely wounded state that warranted a field healing from Lissa here—be able to burn a moving cart down? And then leave myself at the scene of the crime after stabbing myself?" She turned her attention to Chrom once more. "Going back to your name throwing earlier, what smart criminal would do something that glaringly stupid?" She threw her hands outward, angered. "I mean, who tends sheep in full arm—"

With a tiny scream, the young woman tripped, fell backward, hitting her head on the ground once more. Dazed, blinking double and triple shapes from her eyes, she accepted the hand from both Lissa and Chrom.

"Are you all right?" Lissa asked, gently holding the young woman's head in her hands and inspecting the back of her head.

"I have a terrible headache, and my ego is extremely bruised. Possibly broken." The young woman offered a smile. "Otherwise, I'm undamaged."

Lissa let out a thoughtful 'hm' as she inspected the back of the young woman's head. "I wouldn't be too concerned. If it is still bothering you by tonight, tell me immediately."

The way Lissa said those words conveyed the level of her passion for her craft. The young woman couldn't help but smile.

"So," she continued, dusting off her back, or attempting to. "Why are you tending sheep in full armor?"

Chrom smiled. Now that she was properly facing them and only the slightest bit dazed, the young woman could tell that each one of them wore some form of armor. Chrom's shoulder and arm was protected by a sleeve and silver armor. A cape capped the regal outfit off, as well as the enormous broadsword hanging at his side (_ Why isn't it gleaming? _ she found herself thinking irrationally). Lissa's outfit was far more moderate for a noble lady. Her underskirt and petticoat consisted of a great bronze cage that made her legs look like caught birds. Frederick was a league onto his own, bedecked in his gleaming silver armor that matched his horse's. These 'Shepherds' certainly did not resemble destitute farmhands.

"It has its dangers," said Chrom with a smile. "As Frederick the Wary said: someone among us has to have some modicum of caution."

"Let Naga forbid the idea of caution when it comes to you two," said Frederick, exasperated, uttering it like a prayer.

The young woman couldn't help but smile. A group of birds again traversed the sky above her head, tiny and delicate.

_ Robins _ , she thought. They're _ robins _.

They resumed their march, the young woman rolling her shoulders to alleviate some of the strain on them, flexed her fingers to get blood flowing. Lissa's incessant line of question provided a distraction to the pain in her upper body and rear.

"So you don't remember anything," she said.

"Not a thing," said the young woman, trying to rub a cramp out of her thumb and failing. "Don't get me wrong, I remember how to walk, talk, eat and all that. I know chess is a game and that the sky is blue. I just don't know my name, where I'm from, or what I look like. All minor details."

"Well, from what my tutors have told me, amnesia can be temporary."

"I'm sensing an 'or' in there, Lissa," said the young woman jokingly.

Lissa winced. The young woman hadn't expected her line of questioning to be exact. A nodule of worry lodged itself in her chest.

"Lissa?" she hedged.

"One of my tutors told me about a farmhand—only about twelve—who had taken a horse’s hoof to the head," she said haltingly. "He... couldn't even remember how to talk when he woke up."

_ That's a pleasant way to end the conversation. But I asked. _

Instead of offering her condolences to a boy she didn't even know, the young woman went for levity.

"Lissa?" she asked.

"Yeah?"

"Do I look twelve?"

It took a minute, but when Lissa and Chrom laughed at her terrible joke, the young woman couldn't help but smile and laugh as well. It almost made her forget she was a prisoner.

The scene was ruined by Lissa's gasp of shock.

"Chrom, look!" she cried, pointing further up the road. "The town!"

Turning from her laughing comrades, the young woman looked on at the town she supposed was to be her courtroom. It wasn't anything grand; there were storefronts, a small temple to who the young woman guessed was Naga, houses and bridges that spanned aqueducts and canals. From their distance, she could hear screaming, see a handful of buildings ablaze.

_ I guess that's where the bandits went_, she mused.

"Damn it all!" exploded Chrom. "Blasted bandits! They must be the remains of that camp we routed three days past." He gestured to Lissa and Frederick, but not to the young woman. "Lissa! Frederick! Let's move!"

It was a terrible time to be thinking of oneself, but the young woman couldn't help it. What did his lordship expect her to do while he ran the bandits out of town? Sit on her thumbs? Take up knitting?

"Hey, wait! What about me?" she protested hotly.

"Yes, what about her?" echoed Frederick.

For once, the young woman was happy that the grumpy knight was agreeing with her.

"Is she on fire, Frederick?" bit out Chrom impatiently.

"No, milord."

"I most certainly am not," the young woman snapped.

"Then she can wait," finished Chrom, with a pointed look at the young woman in question.

"Aptly put, milord," agreed Frederick.

Dumbstruck, mouth hanging agape, the young woman watched as the three dashed toward town as quickly as they were able, leaving their prisoner behind, forgotten. It wasn't until they were out of earshot that she realized that they had indeed abandoned her. 

In the middle of the countryside. 

With no way to defend herself against roving bandits. 

Not to mention, her hands were still tied.

"Hey, wait!" she shouted. "What in the hell am I supposed to do if a bandit comes calling?"

Of course they couldn't hear her. It just felt better to shout.

Heaving a frustrated breath, the young woman shouldered her jacket a little firmer on her shoulders and began her attempts to free herself in earnest.

Several minutes later, wrists bloodier and attitude degraded, the young woman flopped, defeated, onto the ground and screamed her anger to the uncaring heavens.

_ The bloody idiots are going to get themselves killed, _ she ranted, digging her teeth into her bonds. _ And I'm going to be left on this bloody road to rot. I didn't kill those merchants, but they're going to find me guilty of murdering a knight and his pampered charges if I don't. Get. Loose! _

She accidentally bit through her bottom lip in her fervor, and screamed a particularly filthy curse to the legitimacy of one's parentage.

Just as she was considering beating her hands to pulp against the nearest rock to free them, the young woman became aware of a painful lump in her side. That got her to stop struggling and writhing on the ground like a woman possessed. From her movement, she could determine that it had even edges, so she ruled out rock; attempts to shift only dug it deeper into her back.

_ It's in your coat, stupid. _

Standing with difficulty, berating her stupidity, the young woman watched in surprise as a tome fell from an inside pocket of her jacket with a decidedly heavy thump.

"How did I not know that was on me?" she asked no one.

Once again falling to her knees, curiosity reigning, the young woman pried the cover open with difficulty. It was roughly the thickness of her closed fist held vertical to the ground. The pages in the front half of the book were neatly scribed in a language she could half remember. The latter section was a mismatched conglomeration of letters that she instinctively knew how to decipher, written in a crosshatch code of horizontal and vertical lines (and on one particularly stubborn page, an unbroken spiral that grew smaller and smaller the longer she looked a it). It was heavy, almost the weight of a good sized rock, and hand bound and pressed.

_ It's a grimoire, _ she realized, hands gliding over the pages, feeling that unknown part of her beginning to writhe and come to attention. There was talent inside of her, ready to be used. _ I've got magic. That explains why I got goosebumps when I looked at the fire before. I could still sense the remaining mana. _

Letting instinct guide her hands, the young woman flipped to a midsection of the tome and scanned the pages, took in the diagrams and language anew. She knew the spell she was looking for on a deeply instinctual level, as if some of her memories were hovering just out of sight, guiding her from the shadows without hurting her.

Confident in her choice, the young woman held her wrists apart as far as they would go (which, granted, wasn't far, as Frederick was a fantastic knot tier) and whispered the incantation.

A small tongue of fire leapt from the pages of the book (a poorly chosen source, she realized, as the page in question would degrade and burn as power was sapped from it) and wrapped around the bindings between either wrist. It only took a second for the magically wrought flames to make quick work of the rope. Crying out as blood rushed back into her numb extremities, the young woman took a moment to collect herself and then lift the tome in arm, careful of the slightly charred page. Grunting at the weight of it, the young woman quickly uncovered the pocket in question and slid the massive book back into place.

As quickly as the weight was there, it was gone.

Taking a moment to marvel at the wonders of her coat—even shaking it out to ensure the spell book remained where it was—the young woman looked toward the town and, briefly bemoaning her sore legs, took off running.

_ You should be running away, idiot, _ thought the young woman. _ Sir Stab-First-Ask-Questions-Later will be more than happy to remove your head for you. This could be your one chance for escape. Why are you doing this? _

The young woman ignored her inner voice and kept running.

It took her almost twenty minutes to reach the outskirts of town, by which point her legs were cramping mercilessly and her head was pounding anew. Out of breath, the young woman wasted no time removing her heavy tome from its weightless pocket. In the time it took her to figure out that she was a mage with some seriously untapped potential and burn her bonds to ash, four more buildings had gone up in flames. Bandits in thick furs ran from house to house, carrying anything of value that they could find. Terrified screams permeated the air as bandits carried away the village women as effectively as lifting a sack of potatoes over shoulder.

It didn't take her long to get into trouble.

"Hey, boys!" she cried, hand flipping to a random page. When the bandits noticed her, she grinned wolfishly.

"Didn't your mothers ever teach you that burning first, asking questions later was ill mannered?"

Before they could reply, or even raise a weapon to her, the young woman blew them back with a gust of wind and a shouted word. They shrieked as they made contact with a burning tavern, which collapsed upon them with the force of their impact.

Heaving a breath, the tome tumbled from her hands as she fell to her knees, suddenly without strength.

_ Too much mana at once, _ she berated herself, again instinctively knowing what was wrong. _ Don't pass out. _

Groaning, the young woman somehow found it in herself to pick up her tome and continue her jog through town. She passed fleeing townspeople, dead bandits, dead townspeople, but no Shepherds.

"Where the hell are they?" she hissed out.

Rounding a corner, a simple fire spell flickering from her fingertips to light a bandit's furs aflame, the young woman almost ran headfirst into Frederick's lance.

"How did you—" he began, stopping his lance less than a few centimeters from the young woman's eye. His eyes locked onto the tome tucked under her arm, and the lack of rope around her bleeding wrists.

"Where was that?" he asked.

"In my coat," quipped the young woman. "Search me better next time, Sir Frederick."

Before he could run her through, or his charger could trample her underfoot, the young woman doused another bandit in fire and slid neatly around Frederick and his horse. Leaving him to fend for himself (he was doing a particularly marvelous job at doing so), she dashed between burning buildings, pulled villagers from flames, and lit bandits alight with a flick of her wrists and a shouted incantation.

Who knew that lighting a small fire was as simple as thinking (or shouting): "Fire!"

Cornered by two bandits, the young woman was deaf to the reinforcements who snuck up behind her and grabbed her around the waist. Screaming with surprise and anger, the young woman turned as much as she could in his grasp and brought the entire weight of her tome down on her kidnapper's head. There was a solid crack as his skull broke and his neck caved under its weight. Blood dribbled from his broken mouth and ears. His eyeballs bulged grotesquely. Gagging at the scent of pulverized matter, the young woman fell to her back and scrambled backward as her kidnapper's arms spasmed, clutching the murder weapon to her chest while the bandits around her roared in outrage.

Tossing both hands outward, shouting the first incantation that came to mind, the young woman called lightning to life from her hands. So fueled by desperation and fright, it possessed such an otherworldly heat and intensity that the bandits were either atomized into carbon on impact, or blown backward by the force.

The young woman looked at her hands, watched as excess mana and magnetism from her lightning attack crawl along the lines of her palms and the tips of her fingers, and fought the burning sense of déjà vu that accosted her.

"Well then," she wheezed out in a breath, head light and legs weak. "I guess thunder is my forté."

Holding tight to her tome, the young woman watched yet another robin hop along the broken cobblestone road in search of food, oblivious to the pandemonium.

_ Huh. That's as good a name as any. _

Leaping to her feet, renewed with the idea of a name, the young woman—now called Robin—headed further into the burning village. Bandits lay on the ground here, both cleaved and run through by an enormous sword. One bandit was partially decapitated, head held on by a flap of skin, nothing more. Robin winced at the carnage, but followed it. Intuitively, she knew that the road paved by the dead would lead to Chrom and Lissa.

It did. 

In a plaza connected by several bridges, Chrom battled with six bandits, who wielded axes, swords, and lances as cheap as Robin’s own sword, the one that still lay over Chrom's shoulder. Lissa hid behind a broken piece of building. In her hand she held a long clerical staff, ornate with the position of her class. There was a determined, almost fearless look to her.

Casting her intuitive magic, thunder rolled from her fingertips, Robin tossed a bandit from his feet and threw him several lengths, into another bandit and over the bridge's banister, into the aqueduct below. Chrom, his broadsword deep into the chest of a bandit, used his booted foot to remove his sword and use the momentum to swing at the missing bandit at his back. Confused, sword hitting nothing but air, Chrom locked eyes with Robin, at the tome in her hand, and the lack of rope around her wrists.

He cracked a smile.

"Crafty indeed, my friend," he said, waving a hand in greeting.

"Hey there!" greeted Lissa with an excited wave of her hand.

Jogging to where Chrom stood, massive sword casually planted point-first into the ground, Robin nodded her greeting to the sibling pair.

"Sorry about escaping arrest and all," said Robin, tipping her chin at her sore wrists. "I couldn't just sit on my hands and do nothing, especially when I have some skill with a tome I didn't even know I carried."

" 'Some skill'?" echoed Lissa. "That was amazing!"

Now it was Robin's turn to blush with embarrassment at the praise.

"Anyway, I think there's an old adage about 'safety in numbers', or something like that," continued Robin. "And surrounded by fire-loving bandits, I think that you can use as many numbers as you can get."

Chrom again chuckled as the sound of a horse cantering over cobblestones reached their ears. Chrom didn't move to bring his sword to bear, so Robin didn't ready another spell. She merely let her mana pool in her hand as Frederick came riding over the bridge that Robin had come over only minutes before.

She would be lying to herself if she said she wasn't considering setting the grumpy man on fire.

"Milord," he said, barely glancing at Robin. "The bandit's leader is positioned outside of the temple."

Robin looked toward the dove-grey building of stone, the tallest building in the burning town. It was connected by a short bridge from the plaza they now stood, guarded by two archers. Several hundred meters away, an enormous man bedecked in red and brown stood, axe in hand and woman held captive at his side. Another two archers stood in flanking positions, bows nocked expectantly.

"The eastern bridge over the aqueduct," she said. "That leads to the temple."

"How do you know that?" asked Frederick.

Robin offered her hand, pointed toward the bridge.

"From what I saw, this town built itself up on top of the river," she explained. "That building's stonework is lavish, lovingly carried out by masons good at their craft. That level of detail is shown by buildings built for specific purposes: city halls, or temples. It's obviously a central gathering point, whether it be in times of hardship or times of plenty. It's logical that the town will connect on all fronts to its focal point: the temple."

"So, what do you propose?" asked Chrom.

"First: give me my sword," said Robin. "I don't have the mana to spare on any more big spells, and I'm going to need it for what I have in mind."

Chrom handed over Robin's sword, without paying heed to Frederick's quietly hedged, "Milord." Placing the tome back into its weightless pocket, Robin gripped her sword by the hilt, felt the wrapped grip almost meld back to her hand. Possessing four sides, forged from a weak quality bronze, the metal looked brittle and prone to breaking. It was a cheap sword, but it had undoubtedly served her well, judging by the care she kept by honing its crossed blades to a dangerous edge and rewrapping the grip in supple leather.

"Thank you, Chrom," she said. "Second: I need you—" She pointed to Chrom. "—and you—" Another point to Frederick. "—To lead the frontal assault over the north bridge."

"And what of Lissa?" asked Frederick. "Surely you don't expect her to go with you."

"In fact, I do."

"Over my—" began Frederick, tightening his grip on his lance once more. Even the horse looked angry.

"I'll go," said Lissa strongly.

"Milady, I strongly—"

"I'm going." Lissa crossed to Robin's side, chin held high in defiance.

"We'll flank the bandit leader," continued Robin. "Clear the way for you to move in."

"And what of the hostage?" asked Chrom.

"Don't worry about her," she assured. "I'll take care of her."

"Remember, milady," said Frederick to Robin in passing. "We face practiced thieves and murderers. They will grant us no quarter. Understand that this is a battle; kill or be killed."

Robin smiled disarmingly as she readied her sword in one hand and patted the area where her tome lay beneath her coat.

"Thirdly, milords," she said. "Please call me Robin."

And with that, Robin was off, Lissa following in tow as the pair made their way over the eastern bridge and back into the burning sections of town. This section was mostly burned, devoid of villagers and bandits. But Robin did not relax her guard. She held out her hand to stop Lissa.

"What's wrong?" Lissa asked, holding tight to her staff for strength.

Robin rose a finger to her lips and gestured for Lissa to look at the smouldering ruins of buildings. They were perfect locations for an ambush. Surely some houses still had valuables within them?

The only warning Robin had of the ambush she knew was coming was a war cry, wordless and wrathful. Pivoting, shoving Lissa behind her protectively, Robin swung upward from the hips, using her pelvis as a fulcrum to drive her sword into the side of one bandit wielding an enormous war axe. Ducking beneath the blow, kicking his weapon away as it tumbled from fingertips, Robin followed Chrom's example from earlier and used her booted foot to unbury her sword and send the dying bandit backward. An incantation was already in mind to deal with the other two fur-cloaked men, who were making their way down the alley at a fast clip.

"Duck!" she shouted in warning to Lissa.

Lissa dove to the cobblestones as thunder arced from Robin's free hand, connecting with either bandit, using their weapons as conductors. Their dying screams echoed in the alley before they were cut silent. Robin teetered on her feet, unsteady and wrung dry of mana.

"Here," said Lissa, digging into a pocket of her dress. From a hidden pouch she withdrew a small phial filled with some sort of potion. It was vaguely brown in color, like dirty water or mud. At Robin's hesitant look, Lissa continued: "It's a concoction. It'll help you replenish your mana quicker."

Eyebrow still skeptically raised, Robin dutifully took the concoction, unstoppered it, and paused to smell it.

"Eugh," she groaned, gagging at the pungent scent of herbs and something that vaguely smelled of feet. "This better work," she continued dryly. "If not, I can't take out those archers."

Lissa nodded confidently. "Don't worry. It will."

Robin resisted the urge to pinch her nose shut to force the concoction down her throat. Closing her eyes, she grimaced as the potion—which tasted as foul as it smelled—slid down her throat like slime. Coughing, resisting the urge to retch, Robin handed both phial and stopper back to Lissa.

"Wow," said the cleric, placing the empty phial's stopper back on and putting it back in the pouch in her skirt. "That's the first time I've ever seen someone get that down in one go. Miriel threw it back up the first time."

Grimacing out a smile, Robin gestured for them to move forward.

"I can see why," she deadpanned.

Both she and Lissa shared a quiet chuckle as they continued onward, keeping to the shadows of the eaves of houses. Before long, they slunk across the bridge that lead to the rear of the temple, and crept around its side.

From her vantage point, Robin could see the bandit chief and his hostage. Both archers beside their chief, one aiming at the head of the crying woman, the other at Chrom and Frederick, vacillating back and forth between the two. Turning to Lissa, Robin whispered:

"Go around the other side. When you see my signal, grab the woman and run."

Lissa looked more confused than scared.

"What's your signal going to be?" she asked.

Robin smiled wryly.

"You won't miss it. Trust me."

Lissa nodded determinedly and quietly crept around the temple's corner, leaving Robin alone to contemplate her recently discovered tactical mindset. However, she didn't dare delve into the reasons behind such a natural reaction. She couldn't afford another migraine now, not with four lives in danger.

Crouching, Robin sheathed her sword at her side (both sheath and sword were comfortably nestled in one of the many interlocking belts at her waist) and removed her tome from her coat. She didn't even balk at it's significant weight; it didn't bother her how quickly she became used to holding it before. Perhaps it was muscle memory, more deeply ingrained in her than regular memories?

A stab of pain in her forehead immediately removed her from that train of thought, and put her back to finding the proper spell in her book.

Robin spent little time thumbing through her tome; she came across the spell she needed toward the end of the book, in the mess of crosshatched scrawl. She could feel her mana returning to her, and for that she was grateful. At a casual glance at the spell she wanted to cast, it would eat through almost all of her usually available mana.

_ Why does it feel like this won't be the first time I pass out from overextending myself? _ she wondered idly.

Confident that she had the spell memorized, Robin snapped the book closed and leaned slightly out of the shadows to see Frederick and Chrom in the middle of the north bridge, reluctant to get closer to the leader of the bandits and his threatened hostage.

"Here, sheepy sheepy sheepy!" sang the bandit mockingly. "Come to the slaughter!"

Robin, fingers loose and hand upraised, whispered the incantation she had committed to both memory and book:

_ "Descend from heaven, O storm of flame and brimstone." _

Above the temple, thick and ominous clouds gathered, rumbling with the threat of thunder. But the spell that Robin was working was far more in depth than a light show. Eyes closed, concentration lining her face, she continued:

_ "Descend, O Pyre of Micaiah. Descend!" _

With a whistle, the clouds over head split, sending a fireball crashing down upon the archer farthest from her, the one holding his nocked arrow to the hostage's head. The bandit didn't have time to scream; incineration was instantaneous.

With a shout of surprise as the fire burned itself out and left nothing behind but a scorch mark, the bandit leader spun, removing an axe from his belt and holding it threateningly to both Frederick and Chrom. Lissa was quick on her feet as she ran from the shadows—understanding the signal and utilizing the distraction—and grabbed the woman by the arm. Before the archer or leader could comprehend that their hostage had been snatched, Robin was immediately on her feet, sword at the ready.

An arrow caught her in the shoulder, burying itself into bone. The pain was almost enough to make her drop her sword, but she wasted no time in rolling to avoid a veritable hail of projectiles. The archer closest to her had recovered quicker than his chief, and had made himself busy trying to end the life of the woman who had taken his comrade's.

Robin paused only to break the shaft off and toss nock and fletching to the side. Shoulder burning, face set in a tight grimace, Robin charged the archer as Frederick and Chrom moved in on the leader.

"You dare defy the will of Garrick?" proclaimed the chieftain, brandishing his axe. "Come, my little sheep! Let me end your delusions!"

Another arrow grazed the tip of Robin's ear. Ducking, she rolled once more and, in a show of finesse that belied her apparent inexperience, ran the archer through the neck with an upward stroke of her blade.

Turning, Robin took stock of Chrom, Lissa, the woman, Frederick, and the chief (whose name was apparently Garrick)'s positions. Frederick had returned to the north bridge, holding it single handedly against no less than eight bandits, a figure of war upon his great charger. The horse seemed to be taking its anger out on her by trampling its enemies underfoot. _ Better you lot than m _e, she thought. Chrom had engaged Garrick the Sanctimonious Chief, matching him blade for blade. The axe—again cheap and ill fashioned—clanged its own doom against the massive, ornate broadsword wielded by Chrom.

_ Falchion_, thought Robin, with the same certainty that possessed her over Chrom's name. _ That's it’s name. _

Groaning aloud, headache and lack of mana bringing her to her knees, Robin blinked wearily at the battle, too weak to even lift her sword. It clattered uselessly to her side, a harbinger of not her death, but Garrick's.

With a scream of anguish, the leader of the bandits was felled. Robin, half slumped on the ground, found herself manhandled to a more upright position and felt that same slimy concoction make its way down her throat. Coughing, sputtering, Robin felt her strength slowly return to her, clear her mind enough to see the three standing around her. Well, two. Lissa was once again crouched before Robin, hands on her shoulders to steady her.

Robin smiled weakly.

"We have _ got _ to stop meeting like this," she said, accepting Lissa's assistance as she staggered drunkenly to her feet, leaning heavily on both the girl and her sword for support.

Chrom laughed. Either she had taken a blow to the head, or she was dead, for Robin swore she saw a slight flicker of a smile cross Frederick's face at her jape.

"Wow, Robin," said Lissa, awestruck. "Swords, tactics, and tomes? You're amazing!"

"She's right," agreed Chrom as he sheathed Falchion at his side. "You're certainly no helpless victim."

Blushing again, Robin offered both the girl and Chrom her most winning smile.

"I know," she said. "I told you I was crafty."

"Crafty indeed," mused Frederick. "Did you sit on your name from the moment you woke?"

Robin, too tired to rise to the bait, merely shrugged and pointed to a flock of robins nesting in an untouched tree. "Your robin population is extremely dense in this part of Ylisse," said Robin. "And they like freedom. It was only fitting that I name myself after them."

Lissa looked crestfallen. "So you didn't remember your name?"

Robin laughed. "No, Lissa. I didn't. But at least it's something to call me besides “Hey, you.” "

Chrom laughed as well. "That it is," he agreed.

Confident that she would not fall unsupported, Robin stepped away from Lissa and looked down at herself. Her shoulder still stung from the untouched arrowhead. The sword at her waist and tome in her coat, the naturalness of either weapon, bespoke of intensive training with either of them. It almost made her want to wonder who she was before she woke up in the field, without her memories, an amnesiac (after some thought, she determined that 'amnesiac' had something to do with memories). But the threat of a migraine made her shy away from such thought.

"So," she mused, locking eyes with Frederick, who looked awfully ready to truss her up like a hog and throw her over the back of his horse for the journey home. "Am I still under arrest?"

Frederick looked ready to say yes, but Chrom had other ideas.

"You fought beside us, guided our swords in battle, risked your life," he said. "That makes you a friend and ally."

"Milord," began Frederick. For a moment, Robin was sure he was going to clap her in irons without his lord's permission. However, he continued: "Did you notice that the bandits spoke with a Plegian accent?"

_ Now I'm sure that's a country, _ thought Robin as Lissa bade her to sit on the ground and move her coat from her shoulders to rest around her elbows.

"Frederick, my bag?" asked Lissa politely.

Frederick immediately dismounted and removed a leather satchel from the saddlebag of his charger. He deposited it beside Lissa (_How is his armor so neat? _thought Robin, awestruck at Frederick's still spotless visage, despite the blood and dirt that caked her, Chrom, and even Lissa) and moved back to his position by Chrom, but did not remount.

"I assume Plegia's some sort of rival state?" inquired Robin as Lissa pulled her shirtsleeve away to probe the arrow wound with some sort of pinching tool. Choking on a scream, Robin almost jerked away from the source of the pain, but as quickly as it had started, it ended. Lissa held an arrowhead between the pinching needles, covered in her muscle and blood.

Robin barely resisted the urge to vomit.

As Lissa dressed the wound with neat linen and what she called a "vulnerary paste", Robin returned her attention to Chrom and Frederick.

"You're not that far off the mark," said Chrom, once Robin had regained her wits. "Plegia is Ylisse's western neighbor. They're quite fond of sending 'unofficial' raiding parties over the border to antagonize us into action."

"Sounds like a friendly lot," said Robin. She had begun to notice the villagers beginning to creep toward the temple, realizing that the threat was gone and their saviors were still there.

Lissa scowled as she tied off the bandage on Robin's shoulder. "Yeah, but it's the villagers who suffer for it!" she snapped, helping Robin back into her sleeves. She removed a length of cloth from her bag and, despite Frederick's protest of, "Milady, that's your Valmese shawl…" tied a knot in the soft fabric and draped it around Robin's neck. With Lissa's help, she was able to rest her injured arm comfortably in the makeshift sling.

"I'm sorry if I bleed on it," apologized Robin.

Lissa waved her hand dismissively. "You need it more than I do," she protested.

The scent of steam filled the air. The villagers, content that the four crouched in the square meant their ravaged homes no harm, had begun to control the fires that still raged. Many had formed bucket chains stretching to the aqueducts. Robin marveled at their sense of camaraderie and loyalty to both one another and their home.

"Why don't you go and meet with Plegia's head of state then, if their 'unofficial' raiding parties are so detrimental to Ylisse?" asked Robin.

"The Exalt doesn't wish to antagonize Plegia," said Chrom, a hint of bitterness in his voice.

"Besides," said Frederick with a very, very, very slight smile. "That's what we're here for."

_ Shepherds indeed, _ thought Robin as an elderly man approached them. _ But not of sheep. Of people. How… noble. _

"Milords! Miladies!" the oldster proclaimed once he was close enough. By the deference his people showed him and his significant age, Robin immediately pegged him as the town's mayor, or priest. "We are but a simple village; please allow us to feed and house you for tonight!"

The idea of resting her feet and getting a hot meal (and hopefully a bath) immediately made Robin perk up.

Frederick, however, had other plans.

"Thank you for your generous offer," he said diplomatically. "But we must press on for Ylisstol with all haste."

Lissa, who was as weary as Robin, completely ignored Frederick's declaration.

"Dark meat for me, medium well, no salt in the soup—"

She trailed off as Frederick's words cemented themselves in her head. "Wait, we're not staying? Frederick—"

"No buts, milady."

"It's nearly dark!"

"And we will camp when it's dark." Robin heard the smile in Frederick's voice. "I thought you wanted to learn to live off the land, make your bed out of twigs, and eat bear meat?"

Scowling good naturedly, Lissa said, "Sometimes, Frederick, I really hate you."

"A burden I will somehow bear, milady," said Frederick.

Unable to resist her urge to laugh, Robin looked to Chrom, who was also wiping tears of mirth out of his eyes.

"You have quite the stern lieutenant here," she said, choosing a more diplomatic word out of the vast bank of choices at her mercy.

Lissa grumbled as the oldster retreated back to his people.

"I can think of a few other words that can describe him better than 'stern'," she said snappishly.

With renewed laughter, Chrom said, "Frederick only really smiles when he's about to bring down his axe."

"Or let his horse trample possible murderers," choked out Robin, laughing until she was red in the face.

Frederick, however, was not pleased with the conversation's turn.

"You do realize that I'm still present?" he asked.

"Oh yes," said Lissa.

"Completely knowledgeable of that fact," laughed out Robin.

"Never a doubt in my mind that you never left," wheezed Chrom, nearly bent double from the force of his laughter. He recovered after a moment.

"Robin," continued Chrom, in a far more serious vein. "You've fought today for Ylissean lives. You are an able tactician, and I would be honored to have you join us as a Shepherd."

Well, that was a quick shift from "murderer".

"Chrom…" she began.

"Milord," said Frederick. "We still aren't sure if she was with the Plegians in this skirmish." He looked at her. "She wears the robes of their dark mages, for Naga's sake."

Robin looked down at her coat, warm and magical.

"It's a warm coat," was her only defense.

"Frederick," said Chrom, "the Plegians here in Southtown would have recognized her as one of their own."

"There could be another raiding party that knows—"

"Enough," said Chrom. "I won't damn her for being Plegian. I'm not my father."

The last part was said in a whisper, so low that Robin missed it. She had unconsciously offered her hands, awaiting to be clapped in irons as the pair exchanged words.

"Milord," continued Frederick, "I know you're heeding the counsel of your heart, but what of your mind?"

"Frederick, we would be idiots to turn her away, throw her in the gaol until she's executed. She's a fantastic tactician. We have brigands and Plegians prepared to bloody Ylissean soil. Maybe she can help us prevent that. Besides," He said this part loud enough for Robin to clearly hear. "I believe her story, even with it's oddities."

Finally. Absolution of the mysterious crime. Robin felt her knees go weak with relief. She wasn't prepared to break out of gaol and find her way to another country. She didn't even know where Plegia was, except west.

"Thank you," she said earnestly.

"So, will you join the Shepherds?" asked Chrom.

The only articulate thing Robin could do was nod.

With a smile, he again clapped her on her good shoulder, as if they had been friends for years. The gesture had an immense measure of comfort, enough to make Robin smile wide with relief.

"Shall we be going?" asked Frederick, both horse and master almost glaring at Robin. Almost.

"Yes," said Chrom, offering Robin a smile as the four made their way from the burning village of Southtown. "We've quite a way to go before we reach Ylisstol."

Robin groaned.

_ Oh no. More walking. _

  



End file.
